can I record desktop actions for frequently used complex app interactions?
 

IMPORTANT -- I don't want a desktop screen video.

Can anyone give me a clue how to accomplish this?

Every so often, I launch several desktop apps and go through several steps that I've polished over time and learned the nuances. I would really love to go through this process, record the collection of

• click,
• drag,
• drop,
• copy,
• cut,
• paste,
• double-click,
• point here,
• move to that window,
• ... ad nauseum

Once recorded,

• I'd like to play-back the recording to do all of those steps automatically.
• I'd like to have a desktop launcher to activate that play-back.
• I'd like to somehow parameterize that playback with details such as date, time, day-name, month-name, etc.

Thanks in advance,
~~~ 8d[:-o] Dan

I don't know of any macro software for linux, a google search led me to this:
https://xnee.wordpress.com/
I've never tried this, though. I can't tell you whether it works well or not.

You could probably script it all in python using a library like this to send keyboard + mouse events
http://python-evdev.readthedocs.org/en/latest/

It can be made way better and more complicated, though. For instance, you could check whether windows are minimized or not, and also check their size, position, etc.

Don't know much about doing that, though. I assume it would be different for each DE and probably each window manager.

I'll check this out...

I know about this/these libraries. I was hoping that there was some way to collect all of the events -- open/close window, mouse click, copy/cut/past, key entry -- into some sort of file. The file could either inform a script generator to use those libraries, or it could be parsed to drive a control program.

Thanks in advance,
~~~ 0;-Dan

GNU Xnee

As you suggested, I found: GNU Xnee that says, "Xnee is a suite of programs that can record, replay and distribute user actions under the X11 environment. Think of it as a robot that can imitate the job you just did." Other information about Xnee can be found here Full Xnee description.

This looks exactly like what I want.

NOTE that it is an X11 (X-windows) tool suite, and "X11" is what is underneath

X-Windows System description

... and ...

The X-Open Group

most of the desktop screen behaviors. I say, "most" because recent efforts see X11 and antique because it is client-server which limits performance and extreme fancy display things. This means that some of the modern desktop environment actions and behaviors might not play nicely...

... but they might. Hurray!

I'll report on my progress.
Has anyone got practical experience with GNU Xnee?

Many MANY THANKS, orasis and boogerballs,
~~~ 0;-Dan